The idea of a 7:00 a.m. hair appointment sounded a lot better yesterday than it did this morning when I had to get up at 6:00 but I did it.  The salon was only about a quarter mile from our hotel so David and I walked there.  It is called Beauty on Broadway and we loved the outside of the building.

We met the stylist, Kyle, and she is a doll!  David left to get us coffee while she got started.  She was super friendly and easy to talk to so we had a ball.  She cut and colored my hair and then gave me a pedicure.  When David returned with our coffee she set him up in a massage chair too so he was happy to wait for me.  Here I am with Kyle!

Kyle told us a few places we could go for breakfast and she told us there was a farmers' market uptown too.  When we left the salon we headed towards the market and ran into one of the restaurants she mentioned, Gamers, so we had breakfast there.  It was wholesome, good food and we enjoyed it.  The farmers' market was about six blocks long and had everything from fresh fruits and vegetables to cool t-shirts, jewelry, pottery and fresh baked cookies!  It was a blast walking through it.  We did see something we couldn't resist taking a picture of . . . a doggie in the window!

We were so relaxed and enjoying the weather so much that we got some tea and water and sat at an outside table for a very long time just people watching.

David had read about a distillery here called Headframe Spirits and saw that they offered tours of the distillery on Saturday at 4:30 p.m.  We walked over there and it was an interesting tour.  They make bourbon, whiskey, vodka, gin and bourbon cream liqueur.  The man who gave the tour was a hoot so we had a lot of fun.  

For dinner we stopped at a local brew pub that was a former bank.  David loved the huge safe!

And to end the night on a sweet note, David had his favorite dessert, bread pudding!

Another driving day.  We do have to get to Portland one of these days!  We have driven over 5,000 miles so far on this trip and I've driven about 20 of them.  David does love a good road trip.

We left Shelby around 8:30 a.m., heading to Butte.  It was only about 240 miles so we weren't in any hurry.  This trip was actually a change in plans.  We were going to just drive West from Shelby, but when David was studying his road atlas, he figured out we could detour a little and visit Yellowstone National Park and the Grand Tetons.  It's not like we have anywhere to live so . . . .  We know both parks will be extremely crowded and we won't be able to see all of both parks but it will still be incredible!!!  And we will NOT taunt the buffaloes in Yellowstone.  Did you see that on the news?  If not, look for it on youtube.

We stopped for coffee and ice tea in Great Falls which is a nice little city.  Right next door to the coffee shop was a woman's clothing store named Klover which had cute clothes in the window.  I bought a top which will appear in this blog at some point.  

I had been complaining that I really need my hair cut and colored so I decided to see what Butte had to offer.  I looked on the Yelp app and found what looked like a nice salon in Butte.  I saw that one of the styists had a Facebook page so I stalked it and it looked like she was very talented.  It's not like my hair requires much talent but I still wanted it to look OK.  I contacted her on Messenger (you gotta love social media) and she nicely responded that she doesn't work on Saturdays.  A few minutes later she messaged me again and said that if I could come in at 7:00 a.m., she would do my hair and a pedicure.  Of course I immediately accepted.  So that will be an adventure tomorrow!  

I'm a littlle geographically challenged so I figured the drive to Butte would be flat and mostly prairie like.  But no, there were some beautiful mountain and cliff views and many rivers and lakes.  We both really enjoyed the drive.  

There are no Anytime Fitness gyms in Butte so we had to work out at a different gym called Fuel Fitness & Nutrition.  We were able to pay $8.00 and work out there.  This place is gigantic and has every piece of equipment and free weights you can imagine.  It was also spotless and I mean spotless!  I don't know how they can even keep it so clean.  Anyway, we did work out which we desperately needed!

We wanted to stay in the historical uptown part of Butte so I reserved a room for two nights at the Hotel Finlen, right on Broadway Street.  The original hotel was built in 1889, and it was known as one of the grandest hotels in the West.  In 1923 the hotel was sold and the new owner closed and razed it and built an even grander hotel in the same spot.  It was designed to look like the Astor Hotel in NYC.  Lots of famous people have stayed here like Theodore Roosevelt, Charles Lindberg, Harry Truman, then Senator John F. Kennedy, then Vice-President Richard Nixon and David Weich!  In 1948 the rooms cost $2.50 per night.  The hotel has nine floors but only 24 hotel rooms now.  There are also some apartments in the building.  There is a cool, retro bar (picture below), with a very nice bartender.  We especially like the purple lava lamp on the back bar.  We had a gin and tonic made with a Montana Gin.

David is holding a brochure of the hotel but the picture isn't great.  Sorry.

The clothing store owner in Great Falls told us she really liked Butte and said we would love all of the old, brick buildings.  This town is full of gorgeous empty building just screaming to be revitalized.  David fell in love with this building across the street from our hotel and it was The Salvation Army at one time in the past.  He wants to buy it and live there during the warm seven day of summer they have here in July.  Seriously, the man would freeze to death in Montana!!!

Our bartender was very friendly and nice and after our cocktail he recommended we have dinner at Sparky's Garage.  Odd name but very good food!  We are glad we tried it.  Walking back to the hotel David took this picture.  Isn't it cool?

We didn't stay up very late because of my early morning hair appointment.  Stay tuned!

Wow!  Glacier Park should be on everyone's bucket list!  David and I were here once before with our friend, Sheryl Loesch, and going there today reminded us of what a great time we all had on that trip.  

As you can imagine, the park gets very busy and the traffic can be a nightmare.  We got up early and went to the park when it opened so we did not have any traffic getting in.  We planned to do two or three short, fairly easy hikes.  We ended up hiking Beaver Pond Loop (3.5 miles), and one that Sheryl promised would be easy, Trail of the Cedars and Avalanche Lake which was about 4 miles.  We took pictures, of course, but they NEVER look as beautiful as this park is in person.  It was a beautiful day but the air was a little hazy from the smoke from the California wildfires.  Here are some of our pictures.

This Visitor's Center at Logan Pass was PACKED!  We had a very hard time getting a parking place but we had to persevere so I could stamp my National Park Passport!  Some things are important.

Sadly we did not see any wildlife.  We don't know if it was because the weather was too warm or because there were too many people around.  I especially wanted to see  bighorn sheep but we did not run across any.   We still had an amazing day in the park and we think everyone should visit it at some point in their lives!!!

Another day of mostly driving West.  We got ice tea and coffee before we left the hotel but it was so awful tasting we had to throw it out.  Now here we are in the middle of Montana and the small towns are few and far between, but I looked on Yelp and saw there was a tea and coffee shop about 25 miles away in a town called Hinsdale.  The name of the cafe is Sweet Memories.  We drove down the main street of this little town and here was this wonderfully charming, welcoming cafe.  Look at how nice it is.

The woman who owns it, Leona Knutson, was as nice as she could be!  We asked her if she had ice tea and, as a matter of fact she did.  And it was sun tea!  Can you believe it?  David said it was great tea and I think he had three glasses while we were there and then took one to go.  The coffee was fantastic too.  Leona had delicious looking baked goods and we each had a "breakfast bar" which was a shortbread tasting bar with fruit and coconut.  We could have eaten an entire pan ourselves.  She told us the breakfast special was a waffle so we split one of those too.  Along with the waffle came a fresh fruit cup and a cup of strawberry compote and another one of mixed berry topping.  So good!  We had a nice conversation with a customer there who heard us say we were from North Carolina.  He is thinking about buying some property in the South where he can have a boat so David told him about Lake Wylie.  He was a very nice man.  Before we left another table of regulars showed up -- I think there were six of them -- and you could tell they were regulars by their friendly banter.  David and I did not want to leave but we were afraid that if we stayed any longer, we would order lunch!  This is Leona.  We really enjoyed meeting her!

We arrived here in Shelby, MT around 3:00 which was good because I desperately needed to do laundry!  And David really wanted to wash the bugs and dirt off the car.  The laundry room here only has two washers and two dryers and they were in high demand so I'm happy I started the laundry when I did.  After our chores we walked over to a local restaurant and had really good salads for dinner.  Then we came back to the hotel, showered and put on all clean clothes.  Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.  Good night all!